Cards and other devices for performing financial transactions may have stored values in the form of a balance. Such a balance may be available for so-called offline spending. In the case of a high value purchase, a credit or debit card, or other payment device, may go online to communicate with a host computer of a card issuer to ensure, for example, that sufficient funds are available for a transaction, that the card or other payment device has not been reported as lost or stolen, and so on. However, it may not be convenient to go online, due to time constraints, or lack of access to a computer network.
US Patent Application Publication 2002/0002534 of Davis et al. discloses a Method and System for Managing Transactions. The system can be configured for facilitating offline payment transactions. US Patent Application Publication 2005/0236491 of Leaming discloses a Smart Card Providing Data Mapping for Multiple Applications and Related Methods. U.S. Pat. No. 6,256,690 of Carper discloses a system and Method for Facilitating Multiple Applications on a Smart Card. One application may call another application, or leave a message for it.
US Patent Application Publication 2002/0091562 of Siegel et al. is directed to Facilitating Offline and Online Sales. A customer maintains an Electronic Information Account (EIA) on a data storage device, such as on a portable electronic device (e.g., personal digital assistant) or on a nonvolatile memory device (e.g., smart card, memory stick). On the storage device, the EIA includes a customer profile and transaction records for later reference and for selective electronic communication to merchants and sources of goods or services for purposes of speeding a transaction, suggesting future purchases based on prior transactions, confirming product warranty registration, and limiting transactions for subordinate customers. Comprehensive capturing of transaction records is provided by synchronizing the data stored on the customer data storage device and on a remotely stored duplicate customer profile and database of transaction records.
European Patent Application EP 0 945 833 A2 of Kawan discloses a Method and System for Remote banking with a Multi-Memory Technology Smart Card. Use is made of a smart card having a transactional type memory, such as an integrated circuit chip module memory, for example, for daily merchant type transactions, and a historical type memory, such as an optical stripe memory to store more voluminous information, such as account records, medical and personal information for a customer. For daily transactions, data representing, for example, monetary value is stored in the transactional memory and used for merchant transactions, and the merchant transactions are recorded in the transactional memory. From time to time, the merchant transaction records are transferred to the historical memory. Likewise, data representing monetary value can be stored in the historical memory, and from time to time, such data can be transferred to the transactional memory.
When it is not possible or desirable to go online, the aforementioned stored value in the form of a balance may be desirable. A transaction can proceed without establishing communications with an online host. This can be advantageous for low value transactions, transactions where access to a computer network is not available, or transactions where time is of the essence, for example, entrance and/or exit to and from a transportation system such as a subway, underground, or metro. It should be noted that stored balances are not limited to offline-only applications.
There may be more than one type of stored balance system in use in a given environment, or there may be currently only a single system, but it may be desirable to introduce a new system. Carrying of multiple payment devices for multiple systems may be inconvenient, and compatibility between multiple systems may be desirable.
Accordingly, a need exists for a way to manage multiple stored value applications in a convenient and efficient manner.